Last day in Chiang Mai

Our last day in Chiang Mai involved eating delicious food (yet again...no complaints here!).

• First stop was Pun Pun, another amazing veggie restaurant run by Buddhists and tucked away in the corner of a Wat, or temple. Then onto Butter is Better, where American apple pie and cinnamon rolls made Dave very happy. Terrible bagel.

• We drove our motorbike east to find cool shops. Unsuccessful. Found the umbrella factories, ceramics factories and stopped at the Mandarin Oriental, or the shops outside. Not as much fun as we were hoping. Oh well.
• Back to food! Belgian chocolates for $1 each (amazing truffles), followed by more cake and bagel for Dave. Are you seeing a trend here?
• Found a cool street for window-shopping and then onto Eli's last foot massage in Thailand, at the Reflexology center. Dave read the guidebook and Eli got a someone painful foot massage, but also theraputic.
• Time for dinner! Back to Khun Churn for a final and quick Thai dinner - mushroom noodle rolls and Tom Kha, the delicious lemongrass, kaffir lime, galangal flavored coconut milk soup loaded with veggies and brown rice. Eli's in heaven.
• Off to the airport - Bangkok, then to Hanoi.
• Spent a quick night (5 hours?) at the Convenient Resort. Great name. Definitely convenient, not a resort.

Why so much smoke?

Dave finished work in Chiang Mai, so we decided to sign on for a much-anticipated "hilltribe" trek. The ethics of a hilltribe trek troubled us a bit, so we researched many options. In Chiang Mai the trekking is more about the people you see rather than the nature you explore, especially in the dry season. We ended up with the Eagle House trek, which has a special arrangement with two Karen villages west of Chiang Mai.

• Day 1:
• 8:30am - Begin two hour drive to local market to purchase food for the next three days. Smallest market we've seen in Thailand. Continue driving and driving in the back of a pickup truck (with seats) and stop at an elephant park for rides. We, along with the two other German-vegans declined to ride, and instead had a fascinating tour of the rice paddies and corn fields.
• Corn? yes, they are now growing corn in Thailand.
• Drive some more, and stop for lunch in an orchard - lunch was delicious - fried rice with tons of veggies, and more importantly - no waste! Wrapped in banana leaves, our whole lunch was compostable.
• More driving. Start hiking through small Karen villages. Dave even helps prepare rice for the animals.
• More hiking for about 3 hours, through many rice fields. Stopped on the way to make bamboo mugs and collect herbs on the way for our dinner (lemongrass, cilantro).
• Around 6 pm we reach our home for the night - a Karen village. The ladies try to sell us their handicrafts and the men prepare dinner by fire in a super-smoky house (without a flu). We eat a delicious dinner with many veggie options and attempted to sleep in a bamboo house on bamboo slats with a sleeping bag designed for 90-degree weather. It was about 40F.
• We learned how to prepare one of Eli's favorite Thai snacks - sticky rice and coconut milk cooked in bamboo over a fire. Yum.
• Dave was cold for the first time in his life and let's just say, no one slept very well.
• Day 2:
• Lots of hiking! 6 hours of walking through burning fields and mountains and through meandering streams. Stopped for yummy bamboo-rice snacks and eventually for another delicious lunch.

• Around 5 pm, arrived at raft-camp, also maintained by a local Karen village. No roosters to wake us at 4 am. Bathed in the freezing river and hung out with our German friends (we were the only Americans on the trip - Eli's German came in handy).
• Late dinner, but also yummy. More stir fries with tofu and lots of veggies, and popcorn for dessert. Unfortunately no movies :)
• We figured out a better sleep system involving stuffing wool blankets inside the thin sleeping bag. Worked much better.
• Day 3:
• French toast for breakfast! (Rice and scrambled eggs for Eli)
• Time to go rafting! Our guide built bamboo rafts for us that morning! Questionably sustainable, but later we discovered that another village would take apart the rafts and use the bamboo for building.

• Due to the incredibly low water level, our rafts sustained substantial damage, and we all got cut up. It was a fun adventure. Dave used a bamboo rod for paddling - quite different than canoeing.
• A bit more hiking, and we return to the truck. Driving through tons of burning fields, right next to the road. Yuck.
• Stopped for lunch - our only terrible meal of the trip. Topped with a heavy sprinkle of MSG. Pineapple for dessert - which is much more flavorful than pineapple we get in the states. Less acidic and more complex.
• More driving until we reach a waterfall - freezing! Our guide takes a full on shower and we watch.
• Back to Chiang Mai!
• Dinner with our new-friend - someone we met at Chabad of Chiang Mai, who turned out to be connected in the Adamah-Teva community. He and Eli probably had 50 friends in common. He took us to Aum, a delicious vegetarian restaurant.
• After dinner we met up with our travel-partners, the two German-vegans, at iBerry, our hands-down-favorite ice cream shop in Thailand and had more delicious ice cream and sorbet. Eli was super happy with pandanus leaf and red bean ice cream. This made up for not having black sesame ice cream. This place is crazy!
• Back to our home-away-from-home: The Green Palace. Not a palace. Not green. But cheap and clean.

Some insights Dave took down while trekking:

• Bamboo: fence lasts 2 yrs. Siding lasts 30 yrs. Grows to adulthood in 4-5 yrs.

• Slash and burn: guide denies need to take more land. Evidence suggests o/w: villages only intact x 2 generations max, need for more land (guide says o/w, but they are obviously but burning new land w 50+ yo trees, even thiugh he says there are laws that prevent people from doing so). Hypocritical of us to say this bc even though they're not living sustainably it's not like we do either. Cities consume much more per capita.

• Men v women: men cook, build, and hunt. When men hunt, women take over. Women often plant and harvest rice.

• Water buffalo v cows: buffalo better bc give more meat and eat the same.

• Cultural tourism: interesting exchange, or lack thereof bc of language barrier but we got to ask most o what we wanted.

• Women are marrying later (25yo) than previoussly (14yo) 2/2 school (now req'd until 12th) and 2/2 to moving to city for work.

• Guide claims people not moving to city, in fact they're coming back from the city bc life is too hard. Not sure.

• Countryside: not particularly beautiful. Mostly bc so much is burning and so much cut down. Rice fields are dry/pretty and remind us of terracing in Andes.

• Rice: stored after each season in a family store room (kept for drought season). Most still farming by hand on a subsistence basis. Some have started selling and planting by machine. These villages have two plantings, which requires pesticides and fertilizer (if planting only once per year, can be dine organically). Pests include snail, water bug, and rat, good guys include fish, algae, and snake.

• Corn: newly introduced 4 years ago on almost only cash basis. Must buy seed and must use synthetic fertilizer/pesticide. Interesting that u doubt they know what it's going to do to their top soil.

• Subsistence vs cash economy: most villages are in a hybrid situation. They have a weekly market that gives access to town goods for cash. Most are still farming to eat, nit to sell. Tourism seems to have minor effect: 1 group of 6 comes weekly ( and did family gets to cook for them and make the dollars).

• Trash: 5 years ago, almost no plastic. Now there's significant microtrash all over 2/2 plastic refuse. There is no disposal system. Sine people bury their plastic, others burn it. That said a lot us still biodegradable: our lunch has been in banana leaves each day.

Royal Flora

Royal Flora is a once-every-five year festival of international gardens held right outside Chiang Mai.  It's the one festival we're actually here for!  And it's all about gardens, which particularly makes Dave very happy.  It came highly recommended to us, as well.

So it had massive potential, but it was marred by quite a few things:

• Royal Flora sound track song continued to loop over huge loud speakers in the entire complex.
• People tried to sell you things everywhere, with mega phones.
• Many of the gardens were more about fake architecture than real gardens.

That said, there were some very spectacular spots:

Chiang Mai Love

So here we are in Chiang Mai.
There's many reasons it's glorious here:

• Much less traffic and a slightly slower pace of life. Reminds us of Boulder and Cuzco, Peru.
• Much more vegetarian food!
• We were walking down the street from our hotel the first night and were wondering if we were going to find a veggie spot. The second Dave said it, there was a huge VEGETARIAN FOOD sign that just popped out of no where. Amazing. Dave ate some mushroom seitan grilled in a banana leaf. That made him very happy.
• The food is super creative, as it's inspired by more than just Thai and Chinese here. There's a large Burmese influence that really adds some excellent tastes.
• Our favorite places, so far:
• Khun Churn - unbelievably veggie buffet for $4 per person. Huge salad bar, unlimited unsweetened iced tea and amazing curries and noodle dishes. So good.
• iBerry. Boutique ice cream shop with local flavors - durian (yucky smell, great taste!), black sesame, mango, etc. Could have been in Brooklyn or Portland. So cool.
• Whole Earth. Fancy veggie restaurant. A bit pricy, but delicious.
• Salad Concept. Again, should be in NY. Huge salad with 5 toppings for $2.
• Veggie Stall. One of our few attempts at street food. All veggie. So yummy. $1 per dish.
• Freedom House. Great non-profit org, working with Burmese Refugees. Delicious and unusual salads and brown rice!
• Much more NGO, entrepreneurial, and environmental spirit here
• We've found several excellent spots that support refugee camps, shelters, and other great causes through their work. It's nice to be able to eat at their spots and support them.
• The owner of our first guesthouse (The Dozy House), just started her place up 3 months ago. She's a really driven lady and has produced a great guest house. Huge fans!
• A no-foam policy at the Saturday night market...only compostable containers allowed (ie banana leaves!).
• Shopping!
• It's no secret that Elli enjoys a good boutique and resale shop. Chiang Mai has many fantastic options and cool streets to walk around. Not as many malls here as in Bangkok, so it's much more enjoyable.
• Weather
• It's way cooler in Chiang Mai than in Bangkok. Enough said.
• Much more nature here
• There are actually TREES in Chiang Mai
• And gardens (Dave's hospital has a whole garden outside of it)
• And flowers! (see royal flora post)
• Much more "religion in action" here
• The wats here are very active centers of learning and prayer. We've had the opportunity to watch monks studying, chanting ceremonies, and much more.
• The monks here are bustling about....that's not to say that this didn't happen in Bangkok, but it's much easier to see in action here in Chiang Mai

There's only a few reasons it's not so glorious here:

• "Haze"
• So the Bangkok Post warned us of a "haze" that has descended on Chiang Mai.
• The Thai equivalent of the EPA called it "unharmful" and most probably an "extra ozone layer."
• This is all BS: it's of course harmful, and whether it's ozone or just particulate matter, it's no good. The real fact is that's probably been so long since a rainstorm that all the pollution has simply built up.
• The selfish bottom-line: all the typical places where there's beautiful views have absolutely zero view right now. Meh. We have imaginations.
• Transport
• Bangkok has an amazing public transit system and taxis are on a cheap meter system (if you can get a driver who will use the meter!). Chiang Mai has a different, and more challenging for the tourist system. There are crazy red trucks (former pickup trucks) that you flag down, and tell them where you're going. They're small public busses, but the driver decides where they're off to. Hopefully one is going your way and for 66 cents you're off. The old city is very walkable (2k to each side), but we live about 45 min (walking) away. Many people rent bikes and just about everyone drives a motorbike.
• And finally: Don't bring your durian (or your dog) in the hotel, please!

This one is for Dr Defer

So they are having their huge book fair right now at the hospital. They have every title you've ever seen in the States and the UK, and then some. They are all the "international version," which means they are an odd dimension and REALLY cheap. I thought all my WashU peeps (especially Dr Defer) would enjoy the fact that every Washington Manual could be bought here!!

Hospital Image of the Day 4

Any guesses where this shot comes from inside the hospital? It's a toughy...

Random Reflections on Bangkok

Nanglet

• "One can never eat too many nanglet," says Elisheva.  These brown puffed rice cakes with a nice caramel swirl on top are officially Eli's favorite Thai snack.  They also may be the only gluten free vegetarian snack that exists in Bangkok (or at least that we've discovered thus far).  Okay, there's also bubble tea and sticky rice, but these are just not as addictive...
• Yet another quote: "YOU DIDN'T KNOW I WAS A NANGLET MONSTER."
• Nanglet will not make it back to the States because they become stale very fast (hence, one needs to be a nanglet monster to properly eat nanglet).

Ex-Pat Community

• There is quite a large and diverse ex-pat community here
• Americans
• Bangkok is home to the largest US embassy in the world.  Yeah, crazy.  So it's probably not fair to call the workers here ex-pats, because they're on more of temporary assignment, but there are a lot of them.
• Others have simply chosen to live in Bangkok.  Their multinationals bring them here, or it's just the incredibly inexpensive live-in help?
• They almost all congregate inside of one part of Bangkok, known as Sukumhvit.  Fancy apartment towers and not-so-fancy girlie bars follow suit.
• We've met some incredibly awesome ex-pats, who have been very hospitable and invited for dinner both in their home and out at fun restaurants.  It's been interesting to see how disconnected they can choose to be from the US, or how very connected they continue to be (with even monthly visits back state-side).
• Israelis
• Lots of Israelis seem to be in the gem business here, or the tech business.
• Many many Israelis are backpacking around on their post-army tour and often it's hard to find a menu or sign not in Hebrew (depending on where you are).  We actually haven't encountered this too much, mostly because we're living by the hospital.

• Many others...Awesome Brits, many others.

Atlanta Hotel & the Sex-Pat Community

• Sexual tourism is unfortunately very real in Bangkok. Even the 5-star hotels are filled with (well-dressed) prostitutes. Not that we would know. We don't hang out in 5-star hotels. 
• The Atlanta hotel is a very unique place run by a Thai-British family. Our guidebook suggests their restaurant as it has a huge vegetarian menu. However, you can't get in if you don't stay there. The reason is that they have an anti-"Sex-pat" policy.  It's really a great policy, and they present in an almost hilarious manner.
• Well, we got in, thanks to a random connection.  It was a great place to eat dinner (authentic Thai vegetarian food - Dave had his first morning glory curry...amazing) with super reasonable prices, and no, well, sex-pats present. 

Tailoring/Suit-Making

• Thanks to the pressures of Eli, Dave has given in to buying a tailored suit here in Bangkok (he figures owning one suit is perfectly fine).  This was not an easy one.  The fabric is from the UK and the labor is at least being done in a nice shop with a good reputation.

Dress-Making

• Eli found an awesome silk vendor in Chinatown thanks to a friend.  She then found an awesome seamstress thanks to the same friend.  We'll see what comes of it.  She might end up with a Victorian-era hoop dress. Hopefully not.

Elevator Etiquette

• Thais (as a generalization) are quite polite and quite impatient in elevators.
• When you walk in, someone will always be pressing the door hold button and as soon as you step in, they will immediately press the door close button so as to speed the elevator to the next floor.  We mention this only because we have yet to see it not happen :-).

The Beach

Super late update, but here's the news from last weekend (Feb 10-13):

Because of an all-Thai conference and Dave's super awesome attending, we had a four day weekend. Plus, Dave's Dad Jim came to visit before his business trip to China. Woohoo!
We opted for mainland Krabi, more specifically Ao Nang because of its close proximity to the airport and its slightly less busy atmosphere.

• Centara Resort

• Wow. What a place. Really the surrounding scenery is what makes everything so special. There's fantastic giant outcroppings of rock that beckon to be scaled with beautiful greenery careening off most every side (We needed our Aunt and Uncle to help with the geology). Apparently it's the location of the films James Bond: Man with the Golden Gun and The Beach. Either way, there's a reason Hollywood wants to film here.

• 
• Just a few tidbits of this idyllic spot
• Kayaking around these huge behemoths

• Amazing recovery from the tragic 2004 tsunami
• Only way to get to Centara was via the monkey trail or via boat (Dave preferred the monkey trail)
• Breakfast buffet: fresh-baked breads, every fruit imaginable, banana crepes, salads, yogurts, lots of meat things, and did we mention fresh-baked breads (of multiple kinds). Eli discovered a new use for tapioca balls (typically found in bubble tea): balls + red beans + puffed millet + fruit + fresh warm soy milk + sprinkle of brown sugar = yum
• Dave's wedding ring was lost/stolen. Sadness maximus.
• Diving
• We were fortunate enough to take a day-long dive trip out to Ko Phi Phi island. Bleaching of the reef about 2 years ago has dulled some of the color, but government regulations (namely shutting down at-risk dive sites) have apparently helped to rejuvenate some of the reef. Despite the bleaching, we still felt the colors here were better than Belize.
• We saw our first sea turtle. S/he was enjoying yummy bubble coral.
• We saw our first shark too!
• It was not hard to find nemo. So beautiful!
• Dad even got a great view of the reef and its wildlife while snorkeling.
• Nakamanda Resort
• On the excellent suggestion of Dave's professor, we ventured to Nakamanda for our third evening.
• A much smaller spot, with an amazing rate on agoda.com. It's a beautiful cross between ancient roman and thai architecture in a super peaceful setting. We'd come back again in a heartbeat.
• Had to say goodbye to Dad...he's off for business in China...Thanks for joining us Dad!!

• Back to work - hospital + cooking classes tomorrow!

Excuse me, Mr. Short Pants

 As long as we're spending three weeks in Bangkok, we figured we might as well spend one weekend as real tourists.

• Friday afternoon: Chinatown! 
• We arrived via public transit (obviously, right?) and walked to Wat Traimit, home of the famous golden Buddha, which was only discovered in 1955 in the process of being moved! It was encased in stucco and they discovered that it was actually solid gold - valued by weight at over $10 million. Shockingly, not much security here :) 

• Walked up a quiet road looking for interesting shops. Mostly found specialty hardware shops - for your castor, screwdriver and other miscellaneous item needs. Nothing too helpful for us here. 

• Then we found the craziness - just a few blocks away. Junk, junk and more junk. All of David's favorite stuff here - made in China, of course. (or perhaps Thailand)

• Friday night: Chabad 
• 2 main choices in Bangkok - Khao San Rd for the backpackers and Israelis (with recent thwarted terrorist attack), or Sukhumvit for the expats and business travelers. We opted for choice 2. 
• Typical Chabad services.
• Atypical/amazing dinner with homemade challah and lots of salads. We stuffed ourselves silly. 
• Incredibly eclectic group of expats and some travelers. Our hat goes off to Rabbi Kantor for creating such a great community. 
• Saturday: The "farang" trail (farang = white person)
• Grand Palace & Wat Phra Kaeo 
• The Wat is home to the emerald Buddha, who wears a different outfit depending on the season and whose clothing is only changed by the King of Thailand. Strict dress code for humans to enter - capris not allowed! 
• When you enter the grounds there is a woman with a loudspeaker, who calls out if you're wearing inappropriate attire, thus the title of this post.
• The grounds were uniquely beautiful, unlike any other architecture we've seen. Amazingly clean, as well. 





• Highlights include: (photo uploader now broken...we'll add the pics later!)
• Dave ate a whole-wheat bagel for lunch. 
• The rest of our lunch consisted of a delicious vegetarian stir fry, which was most definitely topped off with some MSG. Just our style. 
• Nice walk through two universities, where Eli cooled off with the requisite $.50 young coconut. 
• We walked through the amulet market, where you can also purchase dentures at ever other stand. 
• Wat Pho
• We met our new Thai medical school friends: Napatt & Oil
• They had never been here so David was the tour guide, but unfortunately torrential rain started and our tour was cut short
• Home to many Buddhas, including the famous reclining one 

• Museum of Siam = Refuge from the Rain
• Not recommended, unless trying to dry off or on a high school field trip
• Riverboat across the river to Wat Arun, known for its pottery shard decoration
• Super steep! Not for the faint of heart :) 
• Off to the mall! Brought mangosteens, our new favorite fruit, to our dinner hosts.
• Expat Dinner
• Lovely dinner with embassy employee + family, sommelier & international moving consultant. Good old American cooking. We had a great time.  
• Sunday: More Tourist Stuff
• Vimanmek Mansion - the largest entirely teak house, with no nails in construction. No photos allowed. No shoes allowed either, but that's normal here in Thailand. Contains country's first indoor ballroom & Thai typewriter. 
• Some other small museums, not worth writing home about. 
• Dusik Throne Hall - AMAZING showcase of Queen Sikrit's charity project, which involves the revitilization of the Thai arts. Incredibly intricate gold and stonework, silkmaking, and woodcarving - all made within the last 15 years. Well worth the visit. 

• Next up: Wat Benjamabophit, known as the marble temple
• I'm tired just writing about all of this! 
• Jim Thompson's House - the not-so-humble abode of the man who re-invigorated the Thai silk industry
• Eli ran into an Eat with Eli client at Jim Thompson - to both of their surprise and delight! 
• Amazing how quiet it can be in the midst of the crazy city. 
• Following an uneventful dinner, Dave grabbed some waffles on his way home. These made him quite happy. 

Hospital Image of the Day 3

I think these super-duper outfitted golf carts would make any Barnes Hospital transport guy/gal very jealous:

When in Bangkok...

Photos of the Day: 

 

That's a chicken merchant, if you were wondering. And yes, he's counting change. Yum. 

Cooking class #1 @ Bangkok Thai Cooking Academy. For real, yum. Especially the dessert: banana-coconut steamed dumplings. 

 

 Guess the food: 

 

 And this one? 

 

Hospital image of the day 2

So no one even tried to guess at the first image (maybe because I am just imagining people are actually reading this), or maybe it was just very obvious. In any case, I won't give any of these away until I get some guesses. Here's number two, admittedly more difficult:

Breathing

It's been a fairly wild ride thus far.  So there's two reasons it's not very easy to breathe here:

1. The traffic is insane!  Cars here, buses there, and then the skytrain (which does a great job of alleviating traffic) traps all the smog underneath its mighty tracks.
2. Tuberculosis is everywhere!  For those used to traveling in developing countries or our country's jail system, you might not be surprised about this.  But I don't think I've seen too many patients without TB.  No one wears proper masks (N-95s are too expensive), and no one is (understandably) bothered by it because most everyone seems to have it.

 A few interesting tidbits from the hospital:

• The cases are incredible, and are for the most part super advanced manifestations that we only read about:
• HIV complicated by CMV retinitis and CMV polyneuropathy rendering the patient blind and bed-bound
• CMV encephalitis
• Acineotbacter resistant to every antibiotic under the sun except COLISTIN (for those not from MD land - we don't really ever use colistin in the US because it's so toxic)
• Infective endocarditis (heart valve infection) with a bioprosthetic valve throwing emboli to the gut causing toxic colon
• HIV with disemminated tuberculosis (this is a recurring theme...anything you might think TB could do, it does here with the backdrop of HIV).
• Mycobacterium abscessus (rapid-growing nontuberculous mycobacterium) in several cases that's resistant to almost every antibiotic combination we have.
• Classic skin markings in syphilis in the backdrop of HIV
• Krukenberg tumors (complication of ovarian cancer)
• And the list just keeps going...
• Open-air wards are the norm.  It's unfortunately no wonder that everyone's TB and various drug-resistant bugs are passed around.  Patients are packed 4 to a wall.
• My attending got mad at the general team when they had an active pulmonary TB patient hanging out with everyone else.  The team's response was that there just simply was no other isolation room at the time, and the best course of action was to place this patient near the window for "better" ventilation.  Unfortunately, they were all correct in their thinking (still no masks, though).
• Picture here
• The faculty and staff work so hard, it's quite impressive.  Just to give you a taste: medical students, residents, and fellows don't get a single day off during each month-long rotation.
• The hospital has really every modern diagnostic option we have.  They even just installed a PET-CT scanner last year.  Interestingly, they just use the options much less frequently secondary to cost.

• Their clinical lab is probably superior to ours.
• Residents here do a ton of their own lab draws, lab work, microscopy, etc.
• There is a computer-based ordering system, lab result system, and digital radiology system.  They still use paper-based notes...Just like WashU!!
• The nutrition here, at least I think, is better than what we serve our patients :-):

So it's really fascinating to see an over-burdened public institution working to maximize the resources they have for the patients that need it most.  Really impressive stuff.  More photos and topics to come:

• Outpatient clinic
• ICU stuff
• Generic medicine controversies
• The three-tiered health-care system in Thailand (and why it's quite impressive)
• The work-a-holic residents and fellows I work with
• Eastern vs Western medicine (and why Western trumped Eastern in Thailand)

Off to meet Eli status post cooking class number who knows how many :-)???

Hospital Image of the day

Any guesses? We'll start off easy.

Eating and Breathing Bangkok

I've had quite the week: 

• Day 1: Tour with Bangkok Food Tours
• 3 hour walking tour with 5 tastings. This was an excellent way to start my food exploration of Thailand, and a nice way to meet other travellers. I had the most delicious papaya salad (sans shrimp). That's a pork salad in the background. I heard it was tasty. This company was highly recommend in the NY Times and I understand why - they are very organized and really take you to local spots - not tourist destinations. We also took a boat across the river, from the dock near the Mandarin Oriental, so it was nice to see another part of the city.

•  Next I walked around Khao San Road and affirmed why I'm so glad we're not staying in this part of town! Yuck. 
  

•  Day 2: May Kaidee Cooking School
  
• This is the famous vegetarian restaurant and cooking school - May was our teacher for the day and is quite a riot. It's as much a show as a class. It was a huge class - about 15 people. I got there early to help prep, as otherwise they prep everything for you! No chopping required. I wish I too had 5 assistants in my cooking classes! We made 12 recipes, which was almost too much. 
• Some good veggie substitutions to note: 
• Instead of using fish sauce, which is quite prevalent in SE Asian food (made from fermented anchovies, not shellfish), they use a mixture of dark and light soy sauce. 
• They also use miso paste in their curry pastes instead of shrimp paste.
• Tomatoes are used to give red color instead of shrimp oil.

• I'm glad I took this class, as it was a lot of fun, but not the most focused on technique. I'm going to take a private class with May (same price as the group class!) to get more of her veggie secrets! Check out her outfit! She wears a different one (equally beautiful) every day.
• Day 3: Bangkok Thai Cooking Academy
• Another cooking school - vastly different than May Kaidee. I forgot to mention that May dances at the end of class for all of us - complete with headdress! At this school, you remove your shoes before entering, and it's a much calmer environment, with 7-8 students total. 
• There were 6 students in our class - mostly foreigners living in Bangkok. I was the only American and the only vegetarian. We made a delicious green mango salad, a steamed shrimp (tofu for me) with lime sauce, fried chicken (tofu) with tamarind sauce (yum!) and sweet corn in tapioca (ehh). They use corn in sweet desserts, and I'm not totally sold. Give me sticky rice with mango any day! 





 It's amazing taking classes here - there are about 3 assistants per school - they clear dishes, set up everything at the stations and bring out ingredients. At some schools they even chop everything. It's a different way to live, for sure. At first I didn't like it, but I'm appreciative of the calm it brings to a cooking class, especially to have that calm when Bangkok itself is so insane. 


My dishes for the day (minus dessert): 



 Day 4: Ma-San-Man Bangkok Thai Cooking School 

• Right next door to May Kaidee, I thought I'd try out a different approach. This was an excellent school as well! We prepared 8 or 9 dishes, and actually cooked and prepped most of the items ourselves. The teacher was excellent, very knowledgeable and obviously an excellent chef. They were also happy to make veggie options - using mostly mushrooms instead of meat. I brought home many leftovers to David, who was quite happy to eat my work. 
• Here I am preparing Tom Yum soup (the secret is the Tom Yum paste! - don't worry, I'll share once I've found my favorite recipe!) 

• And here's my version of Panang Curry - using a red curry and Thai basil.

• In the past two classes I discovered a new love - coconut sugar. It's like maple sugar, but $1 per pound, not $30 per pound. I could make a great business exporting this to my culinary school! It has the consistency of fudge, with a light, not-too-sweet flavor and it gives incredible depth to recipes. I'd choose it any day over brown sugar. 
• I couldn't get a cab going home - for some reason two cabs rejected me based on my destination (near ths hospital...?) so I walked and walked and then a nice Thai lady told me in English which bus to take. She saved me at just the right moment. Otherwise I would have probably walked for 3 hours to get home. 

 David should be off early today and we're hoping to explore Chinatown before going to Chabad on Sukhumvit Rd for Shabbat (the synagogue is named Beth Elisheva - how lovely!). We've heard this is the expat/business chabad, and much calmer than the Israeli/backpacker on on Khao San Rd. 

David will blog soon about the "breathing" part of this post! Then the title will make far more sense. 

I'll share some recipes in my next post! 

-Eli